Norquist, ALEC and the Koch brothers

“America was never America for me, and yet I swear this oath, America will be.” These are the words of Langston Hughes, the incredible African-American poet, who lived from 1902 to 1967.

Perhaps the reason why can be understood in part by looking at the activities of a few very powerful, very rich people, and their effect on the laws of this country.

Grover Norquist heads Americans for Tax Reform. 297 members of Congress (95 percent of Republicans) have signed his now infamous pledge to never raise taxes, along with all but one of the Republicans running for president. Now some are sorry. Well, too bad. They deserve to be voted out, since they have basically broken their oath of office to represent the American people and the Constitution by pledging their allegiance to a megalomaniac. His salary of $200,000 for 24 hours of work each week proves that jobs are available for some, like this self-described “boring whitebread Methodist” who also cofounded the Islamic Free Market Institute. Not so boring after all — a friend of Jack Abramoff, with an extremely questionable past.

Next we have ALEC — The American Legislative Exchange Council — funded by the Koch brothers and other very wealthy people and corporations. On their website they boast that “since its founding, ground breaking changes in public policy” have been achieved through their “strategic knowledge and training”. They write “model” bills, and it is amazing how many bills that have passed in numerous states are almost exactly the same as the ones they wrote. More than 1,000 each year.

Twenty-five legislators from South Carolina are members of ALEC — 17 representatives, and eight senators, and not all are Republicans. Four Democrats are members as well. ALEC has nine task forces — Health and Human Services and Education are two of them.

Our recent voter ID bill, and those in 38 other states, is basically an ALEC bill. They have organized to create the poll tax, this ridiculous voter ID, to combat nonexistent fraud. What they really want to combat is voter participation that might lead to their demise. So they fight against early voting, weekend voting, and anything that will make it easier for people to vote. They don’t much like the idea of an educated populace either, and fight public education every step of the way. I’m pretty sure our S.C. Superintendent of Education, Mick Zais, who has turned down money for schools and teachers, is probably politically happy with this group. But perhaps the most egregious assault of all is the recent statement by an ALEC member that “kids eating rat poison is an acceptable risk.” They are so against regulation of any kind, even for rat poison, that they would sacrifice children on their “free market” alter. There must be a place in hell for such callous individuals. But in their world, poor children are expendable. Let them clean bathrooms, do without food and health care, lack education. Who cares?

Not the Koch brothers, the founders of Americans for Prosperity. They have been discovered, in their secret King Midas cave. With their wealth increasing from $25 billion to $50 billion since 2010, they have finally been found by the media. On Dec. 10, the anniversary of Human Rights Day, a march was held from their home in New York to the U.N. building. It’s hard to keep secrets in today’s hi-tech world. Not even money can stop the new populism.